I'd be happy with 3499 pounds or less for the V8 version...anything actually under 3500 is all I am hoping for. That, with 450HP and the IRS and I'll be very happy. I too am very skeptical of the proposed shrinkage and 400lbs loss. No matter what happens, I hope my I still fit in a Mustang. I am a big boy and 38" of headroom or less and It'll be a tough fit...a complete no-go if it's 37". Glad I got my new 2014 for the time being.

I would love, just love!, to see this car be able to run with Corvettes and 911s. The new BMW M4 will likely be 3400+lbs., and forget all about the Camaro at that point. It's gonna be a long several months until the S550 is announced!

 

oops. The car magazines have only been testing the Z51's which weigh 3400 plus.

 

Yes please. That car's time is now.

 

Tires, wheels, brakes, shocks, and coolers?

I wonder what GM will do for a Z06? Its light weight track car?

That would be a major coup for Ford if the next Mustang fully kitted out in high performance gear was equal or within spitting distance of the corvette's weight. Especially if like the current car, the next gen Mustang had better torsional rigidity (S-197 to C6).

 

I've been following Factory Five Racing's Project 818, and I cannot see why someone couldn't do one on their own. While it wouldn't be the monocoque construction, body over tube frame would work.

https://www.factoryfive.com/kits/project-818/

RCR's Superlite Roadster also looks yummy for this purpose.

http://race-car-replicas.com/rcrproadster.html

I was thinking V-6 transaxle though, with o/a 300 HP and not an ounce of extra weight.

 

I think it's most likely ford would be targeting the m4 as a performance competitor due to being the same size, power and type of vehicle. The corvette is a pure sports car where the m4 like the mustang is designed to be a daily driver and seat 4.

 

Look at the wheel gap on the '14 Vette. And people complain about the Stang.

 

This is a pre production display car. They raise the suspension for loading them on and off the trucks.


If you are familiar with Corvette suspension, lowering the vehicle is extremely easy. They have bolts that you can turn to raise and lower the car with without swapping springs or anything. Vettes don't even have springs like a mustang. It's a completely different set up.

The production vehicles have their suspension set at about 1.25" of wheel gap. This is over twice that.

You can turn the bolts and drop the car about an inch lower than that to about .5" of gap with a realignment. You can get aftermarket stuff that's cheap to slam it, but you can't even drive it on the street because it's so low.


This is how you can set up the ride height without aftermarket parts:

 

Forget about the ride height, have you heard a Corvette lately? I haven't heard a C7 yet but every recent Corvette (except modded ones) have the quietest exhaust.

Off topic but - I like the front and the sides of the new C7 but I can't get used to those droopy tail lights - I think those were a mistake. Looks like it's crying.

 

The C7 has a dual mode exhaust option that opens a valve pre muffler under aggressive throttle. The C6 Z06, Grand Sport and Zr1 all had that too. I'm not sure if the base model had that as an available option or not.

Who cares if it's quiet? It's nothing a pair of mufflers can't fix. You're forgetting that 50+ year old people that are the typical corvette customers don't want a loud exhaust.


I think even the back is way better than older generation vettes. The round tail lights were really boring.

 

Eh, Woodward was lousy with the new Vette. GM folk driving 'em everywhere. They all looked jacked up to me, but just this static one which may have had the Magnetic shipping pucks in place. Only the blue and black and dark green looked good to me as the white and red really made all the black plastic bits stand out too much. Not great poster **** as the car does look markedly better in the flesh.

 

Pics or it didn't happened. What about the Mustang !

 

 

My 2000 Mustang V6 weights 3,070 lbs ... so not that long ago Mustang was actually much smaller and lighter than it is now ... its obviously possible possible to build a proper light Mustang without being Miata size.

 

The SN95/New Edge cars while light aren't the best to judge the new car's weight from since they were riding on a modified fox car chassis so that Ford could carry a RWD Mustang platform forward on a pinched budget.

About the best thing you could say about them was that they were light, everything else was just fox car ever so slightly improved.

 

And your 2000 V6 Mustang wouldn't pass existing or future safety regulations nor would it meet customer expectations for NHV.

The notion that the 2015 V8 Mustang is going to lose 400lbs is preposterous, that would make the car lighter than a 911, lighter than a C7 Corvette and nearly the same weight as McLaren MP4-12C.

 

Yes. 150-200 lbs less at best.

I wish it could weigh 3100lbs but it needs an aluminum frame and all carbon fiber body to even get close. Then it would cost $75,000 dollars.

 

I wouldnt go so far as to say all carbon fiber body. And wpuld it be that hard to engineer something close tp vette and 911 weight? Not necessarily. Of cpurse there is a build budget so we might not see matching figures but i could imagine them being much closer in weigjt than many might think

 

Edmunds has become a lost cause in the auto news category. They're nothing more than a glorified KBB now, since they shut down Inside Line, and even that always seemed late to the game.

That said, I don't think it's gonna lose weight. Economies of scale don't play into favor, nor does the simple fact that the car has to appeal to a wide variety of people, from an affordable base car to a top tier SVT product. It's not like the F150, where they build a half million of them (or more) without breaking a sweat, and most sell for $30k+. Mustang now is roughly a 100,000 vehicle a year project (with the recent additions of Europe and Australia figured into that), but it still has the issues of it's broad price range.

If the car was going to move up in market, where the base car was going to suffer from a large price hike, I could see the weight loss becoming more feasible. Right now, I just don't buy it. Moving to a new platform, with new federal safety standards, isn't going to make it any easier. If new materials are developed and are able to be made inexpensively and in large quantities, then I retract my statement.

 

I think lower weight is pretty much a given. I think 400 lbs seems a bit preposterous but to say that no weight will be lost due to some sort of massive price hike to accomplish it.... I point you to the new Mazda 6. It has lost a respectable amount of weight, didn't get substantially smaller and didn't suffer an unreasonable price increase. And Mazda is much smaller than Ford. So if Mazda can do it on a car priced in the 20's and 30's, there's no reason Ford can't do it.